


First-Name Basis

by Santhe



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, Forgiveness, Good Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Head Boy Draco Malfoy, Head Girl Hermione Granger, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Hogwarts Head Boys & Head Girls, Hook-Up, Hurt/Comfort, Legilimency (Harry Potter), POV Hermione Granger, Panic Attacks, Past Hermione Granger/Ron Weasley, Pining Draco Malfoy, Post-Canon, Post-War, Redemption, Sharing a Bed, but with feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:29:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27372715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Santhe/pseuds/Santhe
Summary: “I’m not trying to getridof you,” she whispers, folding in further. His pacing hesitates, halfway between her and the fire.He has his old, icy voice back, but there’s a new tremor to it now. “Then whatareyou doing?”With her hands pressed to her chest, she can feel what he felt—pulse hammering well over two hundred beats per minute. Chest stuttering, muscles shaking, voice broken when she quietly admits, “I’m solonely, Draco; aren’t you?”
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Comments: 20
Kudos: 313





	First-Name Basis

“Honestly, Harry, it’s fine. And I do wish you would stop harping on it.” Hermione glances up from her page, lifting the tip of the quill long enough to scowl down at her friend in the fireplace. 

Harry’s head, visible in the common room hearth curtesy of a dash of floo powder, scowls right back—as if, with its track record, it has any right to judge her decision making. “Hermione, this crosses a line and you know it. I mean, to make him live with you, after all you’ve been through—” 

“Because he hasn’t been through anything, right,” growls Hermione, returning to her task. Dissertations on the wellbeing and rights of humanoids are stupendously unlikely to write themselves, no matter the distractions provided by the coals. 

Instead of leaving her be, Harry’s tone turns sour, taking on that special inflection of heroic arrogance that only ‘the chosen one’ manages to really pull off. “I think you should go to McGonagall. Torturing people and being tortured are not exactly the same experience.” 

The quill tip snaps. She stares at the inkblot, the ballistic blemish soaking up the end of a perfectly shaped cursive ‘S,’ ribs tightening under her worn red sweater. The one with the ‘H’ stitched in, she remembers—a flash of ginger, a flash of marble, and, curious, she can feel her heart beating in her fingertips, can see her pulse in the black ink spreading across her carefully penned lines, over the faint call of her name from the coals. 

Closer, a door snaps open and, “Granger,” a sleek voice, a greeting, and she’s supposed to nod without looking, carry on writing, she knows this. 

Her knuckles ripple and a feather snaps and her eyes close; too many people are saying her name. 

Faintly: “Hermione, what—” “Sod off, Potter,” and the fire flickers out with a whispered spell. 

“Granger. What’s—Granger, look at me.” 

Fingers close around her wrist—an echo in her head, a rip in her forearm—and she yelps, jerks back, reaches for her wand and finds— 

Nothing. 

Her breath comes out all at once and she twists, kicks, scrabbling over quills and candles and textbooks on the coffee table, losing her grip on the essay. 

“Granger. Hermione!” Hand on the nape of her neck, tugging her around, and she breathes in sharply and finds herself staring up straight up into the narrow grey eyes Malfoy. 

“Hermione. Merlin, breathe, would you?” It’s under his breath, almost to himself, but she doesn’t miss the movement—the hand not curled around her spine, proffering a wand at her. 

She grabs for it without preamble, jerks away from his nails on her skin and falls back along the couch, pointing her wand at him. 

Or—two wands. 

He blinks at her while she stares at her hand. Her wand, carved and elegant, pointed at his heart; his, thin and black, pointed back at hers. 

He proffers his hands, mock resignation. “Alright, Granger, you’ve got me. I warn you, though, cast off any sort of spell with your power and you’ll hit yourself just as bad as you hit me.” 

The touch of his old smirk is what does it, matched with those slightly-too-wide-eyes. If Harry’s wondering where the line is, really wants to know, well, that’s it: the eyes and the smile don’t match anymore. 

She splits the wands, thrusts his back at him, and cradles her left arm to her chest. 

“Sorry,” she mumbles. “You—surprised me.” As good an excuse as any, truth be told. They’d both been on tenterhooks since returning to the school, mere months after battling on opposing sides of a the war, only to learn that with the real seventh years occupying what would have been their quarters, the Head Boy and Girl would be sharing this cozy establishment. 

They were nice rooms, truly. A full common room, bathroom, and two singles, set midway up the castle with a view of the lake, tastefully decorated in a mixture of maroon and emerald. They’re certainly less compressed than the ground floor quarters shared by the rest of the ‘eight-years,’ who have also learned to coexist no matter their house. 

A cause which Hermione fully supported, of course. Inter-house unity has never been more essential. So she had not fought with McGonagall’s explanation, nor her decisions. No matter the roommate. 

“Is that what surprised looks like on you?” he says, soft, tucking his wand back into his robes. “Funny, I always thought there’d be more rigid preparedness and less…” he waves a hand at her curled form, still pressed into the corner of the couch, just noticing the ripped and speckled leaves of paper scattered under his feet, “this.” 

“Oh, no,” she mutters, snatching a paper from beside her on the cushion, “my—my essay.” It’s the piece with the blot on it—the would-be word ‘Summarily,’ now not to be completed. She reaches for the next page, nearly rent in half and hanging from the edge of the cushion, inexplicably feeling a lump welling up in her throat. 

Malfoy snatches in first, adding it to the messy stack under his left elbow; she actually growls at him when her fingers close on thin air. 

He starts, raises an eyebrow, and flips her palm over with his free hand, curling long fingers under her knuckles to press his prints into her wrist. 

She jerks. “Malfoy, what the—” 

“Hush.” He’s not looking at her. Her mouth drops half-open, indignant, ready to show him what for for shh-ing her, of all people, but—he’s not even looking at her. He’s watching his hand on her wrist, brow furrowed, pressing in just under her palm. 

She notices that her hand is shaking in his grip just before he scowls, tosses the essay pages onto the coffee table, and drops down beside her to touch his newly-freed hand to her neck. Jerking back, air flying out of her chest all at once again, she’s barely made it a foot before his fingers find her carotid artery anyway, pulling her forward with his grip on her wrist. 

He sighs and absently runs his thumb up and down over her pulse. “Honestly, Granger, it’s good to know even your rationality can’t cope with this.” 

With—this? She proffers the paper, further wrinkled by her uselessly quaking fingers, towards the heap on the table. 

He takes it and adds it to the top of the pile, muttering under his breath, without releasing her neck. 

“What—” she chokes out, finally, though her voice sounds all wrong and her diaphragm is stuttering and her chest goes tight, “what are you doing?” 

“Do you know what’s happening? Has this happened to you before?” Level stare, aimed right at her, voice blank. He’s never touched her before, not in all the weeks they’ve shared these rooms, and—and she’d thought she’d been grateful. 

“What? No. I mean—yes, but—no. Ah,” her heart jumps again, and she yanks her wrist in even as he pulls closer, thumbing at her jawbone. 

“Okay, well, you’re fine, remember that,” and she laughs, kind of, more of a wheezing sound with such empty lungs, and suddenly her forehead is tucked against his shoulder and instead of not breathing at all, she can’t seem to stop. 

There’s a knife in her skin, after all 

She’s shuddering and curling, curling her chin over her throat and her shoulders over her forearm, covering those nasty, nasty little scars, and there’s a weight on her shoulder, a chest to her chest, a whisper in her ear. 

“Hey now, hey, it’ll pass. It’ll pass, I promise, it’ll pass, you’re okay,” and she loosens her nails from the crescents they’ve bitten her palms long enough to grip his chest instead, hold him here, because if someone comes for her now there won’t be a damn thing she can do but hope for help from—from someone who couldn’t help last time. Wouldn’t, maybe. 

She lets go, and he sits back, watching her breathe. 

“Malfoy,” she manages, folding her arms over her stomach. 

“Granger,” he replies, evenly, as if he hadn’t just been whispering comforts in her ear with his fingers on her neck, as if her legs weren’t still somehow tossed over his lap. 

“I—you—” 

“Should knock?” He blinks serenely, petting a finger along the seam of her flannel pajama pants on the outside of her calf. 

She shivers and ignores it. “What?” 

He shrugs. “You said I surprised you. So, I guess I should knock?” 

It’s an easy way out, an uncharacteristic offer of mercy, even she can see that. He’s straightening his spine against the couch, turning away. 

It’s a split second decision—shouldn’t have been one, should’ve been a long, thought-out process to weigh the pros and cons and examine the circumstantial evidence and consider the string of events that left her here without her two best friends, with Harry singed by grief yet again and Ron with his misplaced broken heart and Ginny too caught up saving both of them to worry about her, and a mountain of new responsibilities she’d ached for for years only to find them empty in a broken castle full of scarred students and ghosts. 

She was a hero now, she’d heard. If only she felt like one. 

“No.” She blinks, threads her fingers together. 

He pauses his stretching, tapping lightly on her knee. “No?” 

“No, I,” she swallows, unknots her fingers, rubs them over her damp face, “It just, you didn’t cause that. Sorry.” 

His hands tighten fractionally, head dropping back against the cushions. “You have nothing to apologize for, Granger.” 

“Well, I, I kind of caused a scene. And oh—my essay,” she groans, leaning forward to peer at it over his shoulder. 

He blinks at her again, looking down intently. “It’ll keep till tomorrow. It’s not due until next Thursday. And I’m sorry to burst your bubble, but I don’t think it exactly qualifies as a scene if there’s no one here to see it.” 

She stares at the torn edge, loose paper fibers half tangled together and floating free in the fire light. “Yes. Yes, I suppose.” 

“Hermione.” She jerks, registering for the first time the use of her given name. He’s watching her quizzically, mere inches away, and—and the bags under his eyes are very evident, from here. “Are you okay?” 

She stares back and thinks of bleeding out on his floor. 

For a split second, she sees his pupils dilate, feels the brush of consciousness on the edge of her thoughts, before he jerks back, breaking his gaze. 

Dazed, she murmurs the only thing that comes to mind: “You know legilimency?” 

His fingers rake through perfectly groomed blond hair, leaving strands half up, turning further away. “Why—why are you thinking about—” he pushes her legs off his lap, stumbles to his feet. 

“Malfoy! It’s not—” she connects, suddenly, what he’s seen and who he is (remembers him cowering behind the armchair in the corner after refusing to provide a positive ID, remembers watching the tapping tip of his shoe from under Bellatrix’s sleeve). She starts to stand, but her legs won’t hold. “It’s not you, it’s, Harry mentioned—” 

He swears, staggers away to glare at the flames, knocking his robes back off his shoulders. “Potter’s just casually bringing that up, when—what, are you really looking for more reasons to get rid of me? As if you don’t already have enough? Merlin’s beard, Hermione, just tell McGonagall to get rid of me if you’re that set on it, it’s not as if anyone wants me here." 

“I don’t—what?” she falls the rest of the way back onto the couch, pulls her knees to her chest. 

“Please. I thought better of you, Granger, Gryffindor courage and all that, but if you’re stooping to Potter just to shoo me out for you—” 

“I’m not trying to get _rid_ of you,” she whispers, folding in further. His pacing hesitates, halfway between her and the fire. 

He has his old, icy voice back, but there’s a new tremor to it now. “Then what _are_ you doing?” 

With her hands pressed to her chest, she can feel what he felt—pulse hammering well over two hundred beats per minute. Chest stuttering, muscles shaking, voice broken when she quietly admits, “I’m so _lonely_ , Draco; aren’t you?” 

He exhales harshly. She buries her face in her arms, lets her faithful curtain of curls fall over her face, and waits for him to leave. 

The couch dips next to her. 

Not touching, just breathing, fast but measured. 

Finally, he growls, “I can’t sleep for dreams of it.” She stares at him. He leans forward, elbows on his knees, fingertips pressed lightly together. His mouth opens as if to continue, but his jaw closes tightly instead and he just shakes his head. 

It’s been an oddity to watch and work with him this year. It’s really only October, they haven’t been here for long, but even on that very first day, after leading the new first years to Gryffindor tower, lump in her throat as she glanced around a common room full of missing people—he’d held the door for her when they met back up at their quarters. Odd, she’d thought, as she nodded politely and retreated to her room to mourn the lost educations of her best friends. At least if she wasn’t to gain a friend from this experience, perhaps she could lose an enemy. 

He’d been relentlessly civil, if alarmingly quiet, ever since. Splitting their duties without complaint, keeping their shared space neat, and, perhaps most impressively, keeping the Slytherins mostly in line without getting drawn into any real duels. She’d watched him de-escalate the first hallway rift between a pair Slytherin fifth-years and a Ravenclaw sixth-year who’d fought in the battle with trepidation—she knew she could probably rein Malfoy in if necessary, but these students had no idea the sort of magic and spells he’d been exposed to. 

He speaks quietly about the need to let go of the past and she nods her assent. She flinches when the Ravenclaw hisses ‘Death Eater!’ at his back, but he doesn’t turn. This is a different person than the one who traded curses with Harry so readily. 

So, she tries for civility in return. They patrol corridors together, initially in silence but eventually passing comments about classwork and the castle rebuilding. He seems… smart, actually. She’d known he’d been right behind her in potions for years but had always chalked that up to favoritism; apparently, she’d been wrong, because he readily keeps up with her on every subject but arithmancy. Having an occasional study partner who not only completed his own work, but actually understood it well enough to offer criticism and critique of hers forced her to step up her game—not just writing the longest essays, but now striving for the sharpest ones as well. He always smirked when he managed to launch a counterargument effectively enough that she has to make a correction. 

It doesn’t match the boy bowed beside her now. It matches the malicious traitor Harry describes even less. 

She swallows. “It wasn’t your fault, you know.” 

He laughs, cold and high-pitched. “A great lot of good that did.” 

“You saved our lives, Malfoy.” She sits up higher, finding something closer to her regular voice with something to prove now. “We would’ve been killed there if you had identified us. As for what came before, you were a child, forced into a bad situation; the courts agreed on that. You’re not to blame.” 

“As you testified.” He looks at her from the corner of his eye, now. 

She stares back. Providing a character witness for Malfoy had been a difficult decision. None of those who really knew him were worth much in the eyes of the Wizengamot. Harry had flat out refused and Ron was never asked; so Hermione and Ginny went, the former to testify to his actions in the war, the latter his actions in the school. They’d been honest: Malfoy had not been malicious. Malfoy had been coerced. Malfoy had acted for his own self-preservation. Malfoy could have been much worse. 

The turning points were Ginny telling the court flatly that Malfoy had, on numerous occasions, turned a blind eye to misdeeds that would have resulted in torture for the students, and Hermione expressing her dismay that a child who only did his best to stay alive in the circumstances provided by his parents should be punished for their sins and, furthermore, if she could forgive him, the court ought to as well. 

He’d looked beaten that day, wrists strapped to the armrests of that bleak chained chair, tapping his foot and staring blankly at the ground—looking for all the world like the hurt kid he was. He’d blinked when she’d said she forgave him, but nothing more; she hadn’t been sure he remembered the trial until just now. 

“Yes. As I testified.” 

“Of course, you lot were children too, so where does that leave us?” 

She unhooks her arms from her knees, comes up to lean forward beside him. “I never said you didn’t make mistakes, Malfoy, but they certainly were not mistakes justifying Azkaban, and they certainly were not mistakes beyond forgiveness.” 

He pulls his shoulder away, scowling. Scornfully, “You don’t know.” 

Riled now, and trembling from whatever that first outburst was, Hermione grabs his wrist and yanks him back. “No? You don’t think I can imagine? I was there, Malfoy, and Harry’s terrible occlumency skills kept us pretty well informed on what was happening the whole time. I said I forgave you and I meant it.” 

He stares at her fingers on his wrist, then reaches across with his other hand to pluck at a loose thread on her sleeve. “That’s why you and Weasel broke up. Right?” 

She freezes. “I don’t—” 

“Come on, Granger, it’s pretty clear how the rest of your posse feels about all this.” He nods towards the fire. 

She exhales shakily. “They lost more in the war. They’ll come around.” 

“Relentless optimist, aren’t you.” He frees the string without unraveling too many stitches. His hand doesn’t leave. 

“Pragmatist,” she breathes, “not an optimist.” 

“Right. Sorry.” His fingers brush up her arm; her grip tightens correspondingly around his wrist. “And when they come around, will you be officially hopping abord the Weasley train, then?” 

“I don’t—no, we have nothing in common,” she says, wide-eyed, as he brushes along her collarbone. 

“Finally figured that out, did you?” He’s watching her carefully, hungrily, as his fingers again snake around her neck. 

She chokes. “Malfoy, what on earth—” and then he leans forward and kisses her. She gasps against his lips, all the air falling out her of lungs for the third time that night, but before she can form a coherent thought his teeth brush her bottom lip and her mouth slides open for his tongue. Caught between that and the fingers now carding through the hair at the nape of her neck, she abruptly stops thinking about anything but the fact that in comparison, Ron is a truly terrible kisser. 

“Are you really surprised?” he breathes against her lips before capturing them again, sweet and slow and careful. Unbidden, she moans, feels him smirk as he deepens the kiss, nails biting at her spin and stroking over her bare skin. 

Just as abruptly as he leaned in, he pulls back, running his tongue over his lips. She stares. “You need to teach me that.” 

“Snogging?” He smiles wickedly. 

“Legilimency.” 

“You’re cutting off the circulation in my hand,” he replies casually. 

“Oh—” she looks down at where her fingers are still hooked around his wrist, knuckles white from the grip. He loosens them gently, massages the tightened muscles without comment. “Sorry, I…what was that for?” 

“Your pulse was still unnaturally elevated. I thought it might help if you thought about something else.” 

“What, you—” she sputters, immediately building a tirade about the inappropriateness of coping with anxiety through snogging, before she sees the smile, nearly hidden with his head ducked over her hand. A real, genuine smile. 

It fades, slightly, when he meets her stunned gaze again. “Or perhaps, an apology. If you’d rather.” 

She blinks. He traces his fingers over hers one last time before carefully placing her hand back down at her lap. 

“I feel that some forgiveness must be earned, you see.” He stands, picks up his discarded robe and throws it over his should. “Come on. You should get some sleep.” 

“Yes—oh, no, wait, Harry.” 

“He can wait,” Malfoy growls, “he shouldn’t have said that to you.” 

“He shouldn’t have said that at all,” mutters Hermione, allowing him to pull her up by the elbow. 

He squeezes her arm, eyes downcast, before releasing. “C’mon.” She follows him blindly, holding that flicker of confusion when she defends him side-by-side with the confidence of that kiss, puzzling until she smacks into his shoulder. He stares down at her quizzically from the doorway to—his room, where she’d followed him. “Granger?” 

“Oh—sorry, I wasn’t paying attention.” She stumbles back a step and he squints at her. 

“Right. Okay. Did you want to come in, or?” It’s a joke. She knows it’s a joke. 

“Yes, actually.” She marches past his raised eyebrows and, out of moves, sits primly on the end of his perfectly made emerald bedspread. 

He closes the door behind her and leans against the doorframe, considering. She can feel herself blushing under his gaze, but stares resolutely back, hoping she at least looks like she knows what she’s doing. 

“I’ll teach you legilimency if you teach me the patronus charm,” he says finally, returning to a more normal tone of voice, before turning away to hang up his robe. 

“You’ve not produced a patronus before?” she says, watching his back as he unbuttons his Oxford. 

“Death Eaters can’t make them. The Carrows wouldn’t allow them be taught last year.” 

Hermione blinks. “Snape could. And Umbridge.” 

“Excellent role models, but neither was really a Death Eater.” He glances over his bare shoulder at her while scooping up a sweatshirt; she just catches his smirk before she jerks her gaze away from his shoulder blades. 

“Okay. Sure.” 

“Great.” He pulls the grey fabric over his head, settles it over sharp hips. She bites her lip and turns quickly away before he changes his pants; the bed dips to her left. “So, you want to start right now, or is there another reason you’re on my bed?” 

She rolls her eyes. He’s got a good point, though. “It’s nearly two in the morning, Malfoy.” 

He watches her serenely, propped up with his elbows on the pillows, stretched gorgeously behind her—and fully aware of that, if the quirk in his lips is any indication. “Are we still not on a first-name basis?” 

“Is snogging usually where you get to a first name basis?” 

“Obviously.” 

That startles a laugh out of her. He smiles lazily back. “Alright, then. Draco.” 

The reaction is instantaneous; his breath catches, his eyes slide shut, his head falls back, and she watches his fingers tighten and fist into the blankets. 

Interesting. 

He was the one who kissed her, after all. She sighs, lifts her legs onto the bed, and carefully stretches out beside him. 

He goes still. “Hermione.” Her name comes out a groan, soft and broken from his lips. 

She shivers and places her head on his chest. “This is where I get to a first name basis. If—that’s okay.” She can hear his heart beating a mile a minute under her ear. He waits a long, silent moment before wrapping an arm around her back. She lets out a shaky sigh of relief and his grip tightens marginally. 

“Seems pretty intimate for everyone you’re on a first-name basis with,” he breathes into her hair; she feels his voice rumble in his chest. 

“Well,” she starts, scrambling for a comeback, peaking up at him—but when their eyes meet, they’re kissing again. Somehow, it’s a more chaste kiss, curled together on the bed, just lips on lips and his arms closed around her ribcage. 

His weight shifts, hips twisting so they’re facing each other side by side, and he pulls back for a moment before finishing the roll, eyes flickering between hers, pupils blown wide. His fingers flex in the small of her back, a wordless question. Something flutters in her chest, a swell sharply opposed to its earlier stuttering, and she nods. 

He groans and flips her onto her back without preamble, arms locked around her, weight pressing her to the bed. She meets his kiss fiercely, clever tongue to clever tongue. His hips grind into hers and she gasps; the bastard actually pulls out of the kiss at that, smirking down at her and repeating the motion, hot between her legs as he slips a hand under the hem of her sweater to stroke up her spine. 

“Draco,” she breathes and he growls, pressing closer, dropping his head beside hers to nip at her jaw and tongue under her ear. 

“Yes, Hermione?” he whispers back, nails tracing over the thin camisole beneath her sweater. She inhales sharply as his fingers brush her waistband just as he sucks at that spot under her ear. 

“Sit up.” Another small thrill when he obeys immediately, crouched over her legs and withdrawing his hands, watching her like a hawk. 

She sits up too, careful not to jostle him, and pulls the thick sweater over her head. His jaw slips, eyes pivoting frantically between her face and her silhouette under the thin cloth. He shutters when her hands find the hem of his sweatshirt, arms lifting without complaint as she tugs it over his head. 

Then she settles her fingers on his hipbones and watches him hold himself back. 

He is handsome—she knows this, she’s known this for years, though she’d been loath to admit it. He wouldn’t have gotten away with half his antics without it though, that sharp, shadowed jaw under clear grey eyes, the muscled sides and those long, clever fingers. But like this, hovering above her, hips stuttering under her palms, pupils blown wide with want—he’s gorgeous. 

She tugs softly and he’s back on her in an instant, hands running up her sides, petting at her stomach, sealing his lips back over hers with a moan. She claws at his back in return, finally feeling his muscles flexing under her touch, humming approval as his fingers skim over her chest and his hips buck against hers. 

His right hand skims at her waistband again, fingers tucking just underneath, and he pulls back half an inch. “Herm—” 

“Yes,” she whispers and he groans, weaves his hand under the fabric to pet at the inside of her thigh. Her lips part, still wet from his tongue, and it’s her face he watches as his fingers slip under the last stripe of fabric. She barely manages to hold his gaze while he slips a finger inside and strokes; he answers her moan with a contented sigh and a bare smile, and before she can find the words to be indignant he’s got another finger in, beckoning. She whines. He braces his free hand on her shoulder, holding her there while he builds a slow rhythm with his hand, long fingers probing maddeningly deep and maddeningly gentle all at once. 

She says his name and he comes to her, pressing a soft kiss to her lips as he adds a third finger and rubs his thumb against her clit. “Tell me,” he commands softly, hovering above her. 

She moans and writhes, hips jerking, searching for more. “Draco, please.” 

“Good girl,” he croons, and then he’s fucking her in earnest, fingers pumping in a fast, steady rhythm, thumb circling and stroking, eyes on her face as she twists beneath him, shuttering and grasping at his shoulders. “Good girl, that’s it,” he whispers as he twists his fingers and breathes her name. She shatters. 

He cradles her hair and kisses her forehead, petting softly as she shakes, pulling out when she whimpers. His fingers splay against her side, wet enough to feel through her camisole; in the haze, as her breath comes back, she takes in the heat of his exhales on her temple, the sheen of sweat down his abdomen, the barely contained rocking of his hips against her thigh. 

Before he can pull away, she runs a hand up his leg, slips below the elastic, and takes him in her grip. He gasps, chest shuttering, barely catching himself from collapsing on her. As she pumps her fist evenly, running her thumb over the slick tip at the top of each pull, he winds a hand through her hair to hold her gaze, eyes wide 

She gives him all of five strokes before whispering “Draco,” just to watch him lose it, just to feel his whole body buck against her, watch his eyes go blank as his body lets go. 

He slumps against her, trembling. She carefully withdraws her hand and curls it over his hip, still panting from her own release. 

“I think,” he pants into her ear, “I like being on a first-name basis.” 

She laughs. He rolls halfway off her, leaving the hand tangled in her hair, and grabs his wand from the nightstand to whisper _‘scourgify’_ at the damp space between them. She watches his eyes in the moonlight as he rearranges himself beside her. 

“Do you feel forgiven yet?” It’s meant to be funny, but his gaze turns somber. 

He reaches out to tuck a loose curl behind her ear. “I’d feel closer to it if you stay.” It’s almost his normal voice again, almost his normal swagger, but—that flicker of vulnerability hasn’t left just yet. 

Hermione swallows. “Okay.” 

He almost smiles as he reaches under himself to pull out the corner of the blanket; with some quick rearranging, they’re tucked under the blanket and she’s tugged against his chest. 

“Maybe this will help with your loneliness,” he murmurs, ghosting his nails over her back. 

She smiles, presses a kiss to his cheek. “Maybe this will help with your dreams.” 

His arms curl tighter around her. He touches his lips to her forehead. “Maybe it will.”

**Author's Note:**

> just a lot of dramione feels these days, hope you enjoyed!


End file.
